“The reformatorio was much worse,” he said with a shrug. “And it was in the orphanage that I found out about my angel. There was a room they locked me in...he first came to me there. So it was worth it.”

He wasn’t as relaxed as he sounded. I felt his slight tension as he remembered, and got a flicker of fear – a dark, cramped room where he’d been imprisoned for days. Oh, Seb.

“Besides, I would never have started to read books without the orphanage,” added Seb. “Never. And I think reading has been to me what fixing cars is to you.”

I slowly shook my head. “You’re never going to convince me the orphanage was actually a good thing. I’ve seen it, remember? I know what you went through there.”

“Yes, I know you do,” he said softly. He gave a small smile. “You’re the only person in the world who’s ever known me.”

Our auras were mingling where his foot rested near me on the sofa; I could hardly feel where mine ended and his began. I smiled too. “Maybe that’s because you’ve never told anyone the truth in your life. A gondolier? Really? And you stole his cigarettes.”

Seb looked genuinely surprised. “But it’s true, what I told him. My people were Italian. There was a gondolier strike in Venice, in eighteen-forty – they came here by the thousands.”

My eyes widened. I almost said, Really? A gondolier strike? And then felt how teasing his aura had become, and burst out laughing. “Oh, you’re good,” I said. “Real good.”

“So are you,” said Seb, his voice casual. “Look at your aura.”

Startled, I brought it back into view. Its lavender lights had shifted to forest green, companionably matching Seb’s. “Oh!” I gasped, sitting straight up. The second I did, it flicked back to lavender. I stared at Seb. “How long has it been like that?”

“The last few minutes, maybe,” he said with a grin. “So you see, you can change your aura.”

I half laughed, groaning. “When I don’t know I’m doing it – great.”

But the tiny victory helped, and I started practising with Seb every spare moment I had – even in the evenings sometimes, while Alex and the others went over whatever video footage Kara had managed to take that day, trying to get the door code. I helped with that whenever I could, but I was so aware of time ticking away, and the days passing. I had to learn how to do this.